Topic: Help Please - does anyone know anything about these Mdina numbers on base

[seanduxbury]

Hi All.  Can anyone help with this small Mdina vase.  Good MDINA mark on the base but also 4 digits - could be 8516 or BS16 or some kind of interlocked OOS (or 5) 16.  I think this comes under the Sea & Sand design range but would anyone like to confirm that.  Also anyone ideas of date?

It measures 3 inches tall x 2.75 inches in diameter at the widest part (7.5 cms x 7 cms) and weighs 320 gms.

Any help much appreciated

[chopin-liszt]

This isn't "Sea and Sand", which is a design of a yellow frothy body with a random band of Tiger around the middle. (Pic. posted to illustrate.)
I don't know the name for this design - it might be on their current website, though. The use of foil on Mdina is a "later" thing - possibly into the '90s and later, the blue is the later deep jewell-like blue rather than the early teal.
I don't have a clue about the numbers inscribed. Inscribed numbers on the base are something that appear on things from approximately mid-late'80s, into the '90s.

[seanduxbury]

Thanks - much appreciated - I'll check out the later designs of Mdina for dating

[chopin-liszt]

I should have posted this for you.

https://www.mdinaglass.com.mt/en/home.htm

I can't find the foiled range there at all. Perhaps you could write to them to ask? They might be able to tell you what the numbers mean too.

[seanduxbury]

I've just found this from a Miller's guide that points towards 1980's for the foil type of design but not the shape.  Also after looking at the Mdina web site I'm beginning to wonder if this is a perfume bottle less it's stopper?

http://www.millersantiquesguide.com/items/103779/1980s-mdina-glass-side-stripe/

[chopin-liszt]

I've just tracked mine down. Mine is a "perfume bottle", (it's really rather too big to be a true perfume. I think this is just a name commonly used for contemporary decorative bottles, nowadays) and the inside of the neck is ground to fit the stopper.
It is teal rather than cobalt; the stopper has a teal internal part with silver chloride-ed yellow streaks, cased in clear.
If the inside of the neck of yours is ground, then it is missing a stopper, if it isn't, it's not.

Yours looks more like a posy vase shape than my "perfume" bottle, mine has vertical sides, while yours flare out at the top.

[seanduxbury]

Not ground so as you say not a perfume bottle. So a 'bud' or 'posy' vase?  1980's/1990's?  But all-in-all not bad for a £1 find in a charity shop in Yorkshire.  I've also just read on a post in Mdina glass from Mark Hill that the numbering system found on pieces apparently does not really mean anything (I've lost the link - doh!)

[glassobsessed]

Not anything we have been able to decipher anyway...

John

[seanduxbury]

Just found the Mark Hill thread I referred to above

http://www.glassmessages.com/index.php/topic,11201.10.html

Seems there's no consistency to the numbers on Mdina 

[chopin-liszt]

A very nice find for just £1!